The bad- Probably the only RPG this generation that I honestly cannot think of a negative thing to say about it. Been racking my brain...nothing comes to mind. That's a good thing.

It's a trivial thing I guess but I wish the spoken audio was more consistent. The english voice acting is quite good and I find myself not pressing buttons to skip though the dialog. However, there are times when text boxes will appear along with the spoken audio and then will stop and all you get is just the text boxes. It would enhance the immersion in the game if the spoken audio was heard through all the text box sequences. Like I said, just a trivial thing to me. Otherwise, it's a fantastic, cinematic game.

The bad- Probably the only RPG this generation that I honestly cannot think of a negative thing to say about it. Been racking my brain...nothing comes to mind. That's a good thing.

It's a trivial thing I guess but I wish the spoken audio was more consistent. The english voice acting is quite good and I find myself not pressing buttons to skip though the dialog. However, there are times when text boxes will appear along with the spoken audio and then will stop and all you get is just the text boxes. It would enhance the immersion in the game if the spoken audio was heard through all the text box sequences. Like I said, just a trivial thing to me. Otherwise, it's a fantastic, cinematic game.

I made a similar comment earlier and stand by it. I played a couple more hours this weekend and routinely was distracted by the switch between spoken and text dialog. It creates a discontinuity in the immersion for lack of a better term, and I find it hard to believe there wasn't enough room for the dialog on a blu-ray disc. I think they incorporated numerous languages, maybe that was the issue. As for the game itself, it still hasn't grabbed me the way I hoped, but certainly seems promising.

The bad- Probably the only RPG this generation that I honestly cannot think of a negative thing to say about it. Been racking my brain...nothing comes to mind. That's a good thing.

It's a trivial thing I guess but I wish the spoken audio was more consistent. The english voice acting is quite good and I find myself not pressing buttons to skip though the dialog. However, there are times when text boxes will appear along with the spoken audio and then will stop and all you get is just the text boxes. It would enhance the immersion in the game if the spoken audio was heard through all the text box sequences. Like I said, just a trivial thing to me. Otherwise, it's a fantastic, cinematic game.

I made a similar comment earlier and stand by it. I played a couple more hours this weekend and routinely was distracted by the switch between spoken and text dialog. It creates a discontinuity in the immersion for lack of a better term, and I find it hard to believe there wasn't enough room for the dialog on a blu-ray disc. I think they incorporated numerous languages, maybe that was the issue. As for the game itself, it still hasn't grabbed me the way I hoped, but certainly seems promising.

After playing it for over 20 hours I'm on board with this complaint. It is the only complaint I have for the game. The voice acting is so good that the beeping text can take you out of the game. Everything else is so good that I can easily overlook it though.

Logged

" And they are a strong and frightening force, impervious to, and immunized against, the feeble lance of mere reason." Isaac Asimov

I've seen some people excuse the intermittent voice work as a consequence of the game having so much dialogue. The Mass Effect games fit an awful lot of spoken dialogue into standard-sized DVDs -- is there really so much talking that a Blu-Ray wouldn't have been able to handle it? Or are there enough high-def animated sequences to be filling things up?

Some people on another forum thought it was bad form to post about making a profit selling the game when other people were shafted out of their orders due to overselling. So I am going to delete what I posted and talk about the game.

My family loves Ponyo, which we usually watch together at least 4 or 5 times a year. We were glued to the tv last night watching my oldest play about 90 minutes of Ni No Kuni. It was amazing that a game could pull my entire family in like that. We all thought it reminded us of Ponyo, from the animation to the voices to the heartwarming characters. This was obviously a labor of love for the developers.

My family loves Ponyo, which we usually watch together at least 4 or 5 times a year. We were glued to the tv last night watching my oldest play about 90 minutes of Ni No Kuni. It was amazing that a game could pull my entire family in like that. We all thought it reminded us of Ponyo, from the animation to the voices to the heartwarming characters. This was obviously a labor of love for the developers.

My family loves Ponyo, which we usually watch together at least 4 or 5 times a year. We were glued to the tv last night watching my oldest play about 90 minutes of Ni No Kuni. It was amazing that a game could pull my entire family in like that. We all thought it reminded us of Ponyo, from the animation to the voices to the heartwarming characters. This was obviously a labor of love for the developers.

It was made by the Studio that made Ponyo.

I just looked that up: Studio Ghibli. That's really cool. I just ordered a few more of their bluray movies from amazon. Whisper of the Heart, Castle in the Sky, Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind, & The Secret World of Arriety.

This is probably a stretch but here goes. Any of you with the Wizard's Edition, would you consider selling the plush Drippy doll? My daughter would love that thing but no way am I going to pay the ridiculous prices the whole package is going for on eBay ($300 to $400).

My family loves Ponyo, which we usually watch together at least 4 or 5 times a year. We were glued to the tv last night watching my oldest play about 90 minutes of Ni No Kuni. It was amazing that a game could pull my entire family in like that. We all thought it reminded us of Ponyo, from the animation to the voices to the heartwarming characters. This was obviously a labor of love for the developers.

It was made by the Studio that made Ponyo.

I just looked that up: Studio Ghibli. That's really cool. I just ordered a few more of their bluray movies from amazon. Whisper of the Heart, Castle in the Sky, Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind, & The Secret World of Arriety.

If you watch one Studio Ghibli movie, make it Spirited Away. It's in my top 3 films of all time, any genre. An absolutely wonderful and incredible film on every level.

The only Ghibli movie I would recommend staying away from is The Cat Returns. Just weak, IMO.

Anything else is not only fair game, but borderline required viewing.

Totoro is their mascot, and the film is remarkable.

Castle in the Sky is nearly pure adventure, with that Ghibli touch. It's the one I'm most apt to put in, but I wouldn't call it my favorite.

Kiki gets a lot of play in our house, too.

One that I don't see mentioned here (probably because it's pre-Ghibli Miyazaki) is Lupin III: Castle of Cagliostro. Another great adventure story. Lupin has a long history, but none of it is necessary for the film.

I haven't had a lot of time to play, I'm only up to level 10 but I'm still really enjoying it. Yeah it's refreshing to see a protagonist like Oliver.

My only minor complaints:- Why do we have to level up a new familiar from level 1? You get something new and it basically sucks until you keep it in your inventory for a while.- They should have had a quick reload option instead of having to go back to the title screen if you decide not to pay the money cost.

Also a nice to have would have been the ability to check enemy stats during combat (sort of like Persona games).

- They should have had a quick reload option instead of having to go back to the title screen if you decide not to pay the money cost.

That one bugs me, too. My other minor complaint is the series of end-of-battle wrap-up screens. I know it's a standard JRPG convention, but it's still annoying, especially when you're just plowing through weak enemies in an area (for taming or because they're not yet scared of you). The battle AI for your companions could use a lot of improvement, too.

I can see where Turtle's coming from, but the combination of traditional RPG leveling with Pokemon-like monster team building, team-up attacks unlocked by your S-Ranks, and All-Out Attacks made the combat in Persona 3 and 4 a lot of fun for me.

By comparison, the phrase "generic RPG at its worst" invokes my memories of being bored to tears by Tales of Symphonia or Star Ocean: The First Encounter. The setting in those games were so bland, no amount of real-time mashy combat could make them palatable.

Can anyone explain the mechanic on timing your attacks? It said something about attacking when some indicator turns blue to stun the enemy but I haven't been able to figure it out.

I've been wondering about this too.

I also fully agree that the voiced/non-voiced transitions are extremely jarring. Especially when they fire up a very short voiced bit in the middle of a whole bunch of text dialog.

I have seen the Attack bubble turn blue, but it disappears so quickly, that it doesn't seem you can use that effectively as an indicator. When I do get it to work, it's been about feeling the timing. However, it seems to be intentionally hit or miss.